Azerbaijan – Ukraine

The guests will take a winning result from Baku.

In Group D, the second round will be played on Tuesday. In Baku at the Tofiq Bahramov Stadium, two national teams will meet, both of which started their qualifying campaigns for the World Cup with the same result. However, the content of the matches for Azerbaijan and Ukraine, despite losses in both cases, was diametrically opposite and led to different consequences. In the hosts' camp, there has been a coaching resignation. Fernando Santos, who previously managed the national teams of Portugal, Greece, and Poland, lost everything possible with Azerbaijan. Having taken charge of the team in 2024, Santos managed to conduct eleven official matches, of which nine were lost and two were drawn. After the collapse in Iceland, the football authorities of Azerbaijan ran out of patience, and the contract with the Portuguese specialist was terminated by mutual consent. The Ukrainian team fought hard against the French in Wrocław, Poland, so the seat under Sergey Rebrov is stable. Bookmakers have chosen the guests as favourites for the upcoming clash, offering odds of 1.51 for their victory. On Monday, the 44-year-old local specialist Aykhan Abbasov was appointed as the acting head coach of the Azerbaijan national team. Apparently, the Azerbaijani federation will determine the permanent coach after the match with Ukraine. The loss to Iceland with a score of 0:5 was just the tip of the iceberg of the playing crisis that has been occurring in Azerbaijan for the second consecutive year. It should be noted that last year this team was relegated to League D - the lowest division of the Nations League. It will be extremely difficult for the Azerbaijani team to play against the well-organised Ukrainian team. In order to gain points in the upcoming match, a good emotional shake-up, which the hosts received with Santos's dismissal, might not be enough. Ukraine cannot take pride in its start to the qualifying campaign for the 2026 World Cup, but it has nothing to be ashamed of either. The match against France started with a quick goal from Olice and ended with a relatively late goal from Mbappe. However, the 0:2 loss does not reflect what was happening on the field, as the Ukrainian team repeatedly had chances to score. Let's make a bet that the guests will leave Baku with three points.